


most beloved

by viverella



Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Mythology, Alternate Universe - The Song of Achilles Fusion, Angst, Growing Up Together, Hopeful Ending, M/M, POV Second Person, not me using this fic as an excuse to wax poetic abt aran for 5k words aha
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-03
Updated: 2021-02-03
Packaged: 2021-03-15 05:48:22
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,502
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29184288
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/viverella/pseuds/viverella
Summary: Your name is Kita Shinsuke. You are dead. You have been waiting for a long, long time.(arankita patrochilles/tsoa au)
Relationships: Kita Shinsuke/Ojiro Aran
Comments: 24
Kudos: 39





	most beloved

**Author's Note:**

> hello may I interest you in uhhhhh some Very Very Niche fic?? I didn't mean to write this but someone [on twt](https://twitter.com/catboyhokage/status/1348322541744623616) said arankita patrochilles au and I immediately blacked out and wrote like 90% of this in a feverish frenzy in the span of about a week and I've just been editing and tinkering with it ever since. huge shoutout to [kiaorea](https://twitter.com/aeroaik) for yelling w me abt this and for planting the idea of achilles!aran so firmly in my mind that he has lived there rent free ever since alkdflgkjaldf 
> 
> anyway it’s been a hot sec since I’ve actually reread tsoa and I have misplaced my copy and regardless I’m fully taking liberties with the plot bc it’s more about the Vibe™ y’know? and also yes I was trying to figure out how to write these two on the fly while also trying to keep the tsoa vibe so if u can tell that I got a little overwhelmed in the second half and probably made them kind of ooc in the process, no you can't ❤️
> 
> enjoy!! 
> 
> (quotes throughout from tsoa by ms. madeline miller, obv)

_“I am made of memories.”_

  
  
  


Your name is Kita Shinsuke. You are dead. You have been waiting for a long, long time.

This war was not yours, but you fought in it anyways, because you had to, because it would’ve been a betrayal not to. You fought, hand over closed fist, blood in your mouth, on borrowed time, in borrowed armor until the Fates came to collect. You should’ve known. Even wars don’t last forever. 

This boy was not meant to be yours either, but you loved him anyways, loved him like he was the beginning and ending of your entire world, loved him like no one, not even the gods above, could take him away from you. You were wrong, but you suppose you should’ve known that, too. 

Your name is Kita Shinsuke. You are dead. He is not, but he promises every day he won’t be far behind, that he will be with you, always, just as he’s always promised, just as he’s always wanted. You watch his rage and his despair, and you know it’s a matter of time now, when not if he’ll reach the end of the rope, the days and nights counting down quickly to zero, to the big, looming _yet_. 

_Hector, Hector, Hector_ , a rallying cry ripped from a raw throat, ricocheting off the city walls. _Hector, Hector, Hector._

You wait. It won’t be long now.

  
  
  


_“That is what a son should be.”_

  
  
  


The first time, you don’t know him, don’t know anything about him, except that he runs faster than the wind, except that his smile rivals the sun in the sky. You are the son of kings but he’s a son of a goddess, they say in whispers, and you can see it, the wide chasm that exists between where he is and what you know, in the way his skin shines like polished bronze, the way he races ahead of everyone else on quick, fearless feet like he’s never known what it means to lose, in the way all eyes are drawn to him like he’s a thing to behold. He runs and laughs and your father places a wreath of laurels on his head ( _victory_ ) and you think to yourself that this is something you will never know. The sharp bite of triumph. The brilliant high of adoration. 

The second time, you are no longer a prince, but he’s still destined for greatness, and when you arrive at his father’s palace, you notice that the gulf seems to have widened. Not in a way that bothers you, not in a way that really matters, but when he greets you that first day, his bright, brilliant eyes stare straight into yours, and you know that you will never measure up. He sits in a grand chamber, but even in stillness, he radiates action, a kind of constant kinetic force, like gravity, like magnetism. He’s your age, you remember, but nothing about him seems as boyish as you feel, the sure set of already broadening shoulders, the sharp planes of a face coming into manhood, and even now, you can tell that in a few years’ time, he will have no shortage of suitors, that even if he didn’t have that kind of divine favor, he’d grow up to be the kind of man who could become a hero, the stuff of legend. 

“What’s your name?” he asks you, his voice soft and smooth like a stone polished by lapping waves. 

By comparison, your voice sounds small and quiet, a boy’s voice. 

“Kita Shinsuke.”

He hums softly, turns your name over in his mouth like he’s trying it out for size, and then he smiles, and the planes of his face ease into something warm and radiant, and you think that maybe, you begin to understand the impulse that drew Icarus. 

“I’m Aran,” he says, like he was ever the type to need introduction, like the stories of him aren’t already creeping like long tendrils of smoke out into the world. The son of a goddess and a king. A warrior like no other. A hero to be sung about for the ages. He rolls a ripe fig lightly between his palms, a surprisingly gentle gesture for someone who is meant to claim glory in war. 

“Welcome.”

  
  
  


_“There is no one like you.”  
“So?”_

  
  
  


The heft of a spear in your hands becomes familiar with time. You don’t particularly like it, but you don’t quite dislike it either, and every day, you’re put to the same drills, the same movements. Soon, callouses begin to form in your hands, and soon, your body begins to grow stronger, and you still don’t particularly like it, but your hands and your body learn what to do, and it takes on its own strange comfort, repetition, routine, regularity, going through the motions again and again as the sun climbs high in the sky. 

And then, one day, a hiccup: 

“What are you doing?” 

A soft voice from somewhere above you startles you, and when you look up, you find Aran gazing down at you, a sort of intent interest in his eyes like this could be a novelty, like there aren’t dozens of other boys around the palace all doing the same thing. He’s lounging on a low branch, perched precariously with long limbs dangling carelessly towards the ground. It’s not a far fall, you think, but you already know too well the kind of significance even small accidents can have. 

“I’m training.”

You don’t know if he’s looking for a response, you don’t know if you’ve said the right thing, but it doesn’t seem to matter. He tips his head to one side. 

“Why?” 

This, he asks like he’s searching for something, and you can think of nothing to say but the obvious. 

“It’s time for practice.”

He hums thoughtfully, that same low, even sound you remember from your first day. You realize that this is the first time he’s spoken to you since then. A moment later, he hops down from the tree, easy grace, light on his feet like he could take off running at any moment. 

“Okay,” he says, and then smiles. “Then train with me.”

This is something you’re not supposed to, you know, because this is what the legends say. He will be the world’s greatest warrior. He will achieve heights no mortal man could ever dream of. He will do this alone. You don’t know much, but you do know that there are some rules that aren’t meant to be broken, you know this should be one of them. But he keeps looking at you, like it’s a challenge, like he’s daring you to be bold, and you wonder if this, too, is a routine, if this is a test he offers each new boy who arrives in his home. 

“Shinsuke.”

Maybe you haven’t heard the sound of your own name in too long. Maybe you’re surprised that he remembers, all these many weeks later. Maybe you’ve never heard it quite like this. You practice with him. He moves like no one else you’ve ever met, acrobatic and elegant even as you play at battle, and as you practice with him, you find that you may even grow to like it, if it is always like this.

  
  
  


_“Do you want to be a god?”  
“Not yet.”_

  
  
  


You learn a lot about him in those early days. You learn that his hands are as good for music or art as they are for combat, that he smiles and laughs easily, all carefree cheer and bravado, that despite all that, he’s easy to make flustered, if you know just what to say. You also learn that he’s only begrudgingly an early riser, that even so he runs off to the sea in the blue hours of very early morning at least once a week and comes back smelling of salt and immortality. You’ve never met his mother, but you know she lives somewhere deep beneath the cold, dark water, and sometimes you listen to him tell you about a dream he had or wonder aloud what they’ll be serving for breakfast as the warm, rosy fingers of dawn creep over the horizon and catch on the ridge of his shoulder, illuminating his dark skin in a wash of reds and oranges and pinks. You think to yourself that he doesn’t belong in a place like that, in the depths of the ocean. The sun shining down on him loves him too much. 

Aran brings you with him everywhere he goes, showing you all the places you’ve never been allowed—a high balcony with grapevines climbing up the trellises below to reach you, a tiny pond filled with multicolored fish that shine like gems in the midday light, a hidden-away cove where you spend the day swimming in the surf and eating ripe figs as the sun beats you dry. He teaches you how to juggle there, or tries to, and he laughs when you drop the fruit in the sand, laughs some more when you promise to practice till you get it right. He laughs a lot when he’s with you. You begin to think that you may never tire of hearing it. 

On one of these days at the cove, he’s pointing at clouds in the sky as the sun begins to dip, thinking out loud. The high ridge of his brow and the sharp line of his nose are illuminated in a ring of gold. 

_Hey, Shinsuke, do you think that cloud looks like a spear? Hey, Shinsuke, that one looks like a gorgon’s head. Hey, Shinsuke, do you see it?_

He says your name a lot, you notice, more than anyone’s ever said in your life, like it’s a name worth knowing, like he won’t let anyone forget it. He turns and smiles at you like _you_ are worth knowing, even though you’re no one, in the grand scheme of things, and he is so close to divinity. You’re not a prince any longer, and you will never be a hero, you know. You’re just another orphaned boy scrabbling for some kind of purchase, and he has been great since the day he was born. He notices you watching him and leans in a little like he’s trying to pry out that warmth that you’ve never had anyone to practice with. The way he’s looking at you makes you almost desperate to try. 

“What?” Aran asks, earnest and kind, always kind. The tone of his voice is almost conspiratorial, like he’s asking you to confess to something. “What are you thinking?”

There are many answers you could give. Some are easy ( _that clouds are just clouds no matter what stories we tell_ ) and some are difficult ( _that any story from you would be worth hearing anyways_ ), but you’ve never been quite so good with words, not like him. You’ve been told that you’re too quiet, too difficult to read to be the kind of exalted presence everyone seeks to admire, but he waits, expectant, and you have to do something. His eyes are intent and bright, and a little bit of sand clings to his arms from when he’d flopped down on his back earlier, limbs sprawled out around him to soak in the heat from the sun, and the warm light of evening catches on the soft bow of his lips, the long line of his neck. He’s beautiful, you think, beautiful in the way that the marble statues that line the grand halls of the palace are beautiful, intricate and unattainable and polished to perfection, and this feeling you’ve been trying so hard to ignore lately settles low in your stomach like a stone. He’s beautiful, and every time you look at him, you feel as if you’re on the edge of some great precipice, toying with the limits of your own balance, and today, you fall. 

In quick succession, like plunging down the face of a steep cliff: you kiss him, you feel him gasp quietly against your mouth, and when you look at him again, you find him staring at you with wide eyes. You wonder for about half a second if you’ve made a mistake, if you’ve pushed too hard at something that’s not meant to be yours, but then he smiles, clouds parting, and you think you might be able to see the entire universe in his eyes. 

“Shinsuke,” he says softly, care around each syllable, your name falling from his lips like a prayer as he leans in to run careful fingers along the line of your jaw.

He kisses you, and his skin is warm like he’s steeped in sunlight, and he tastes sweet like the figs you helped him carry by the armful to your little hideaway earlier today. You know that this isn’t meant to be, that all the prophecies say everything about him and nothing about you, that his fame in battle will never be compatible with something like this. You know that this isn’t meant to be, and you know that the gods don’t often take kindly to their plans being toyed with, and still you cling with desperate fingers to the soft fabric of his tunic, feeling the heat of his body against yours. You remember Icarus. You kiss him anyways.

  
  
  


_“I will never leave him. It will be this, always, for as long as he will let me.”_

  
  
  


When he leaves, when his mother sends him away to save him from you, from being mortal, the echo chambers of your heart whisper at you to run after him, to not let him get out of reach. You are not an impulsive person, but you’ve never imagined him going somewhere you couldn’t follow, so you run. You run, and, like a miracle, you find that he’s waiting for you, like he’d wait an eternity for you to catch up to him, and his smile when he sees you is wide and brilliant, morning again after a long night. 

“Shinsuke,” he says softly, holding his hand out for you to take, a promise. “Train with me.”

Here’s another tiny miracle: you meet a teacher who isn’t fearful of the gods, who lets you stay, who teaches you like you are worthy of becoming a hero too. Like Heracles. Like Jason. Like Aran. 

By day, you learn about medicine and music and the creatures around you. By night, you watch the stars wheel overhead and listen to the tales that put them there. Beautiful Andromeda, who the gods would’ve taken as punishment for her parents’ sins. The great Heracles, driven mad and made a murderer of his own wife and child. The gods are cruel, you learn. The gods take, they punish. Their whims are fickle. You wonder how long your favor will last. You sit in a field at midday as Aran weaves wildflowers into little crowns and tucks them into your hair and hope, always, that the answer will be _just one more day_. 

From off in the distance, you’re called for lunch. Aran looks at you with shining eyes, twin suns bearing down on you, his mouth turned up into a clever smile, the one that always leads into some kind of challenge, the one that makes your stomach do flips. 

“Race you.”

“You know you will win,” you say, not because you care all that much, really, but because it’s true, and yet he still asks every time, like it’ll still be a surprise. 

He laughs, the sound carrying out high and bright. “You saying you think winning is the only thing that matters?” he asks, teasing but not unkind. 

“No,” you say, but you’re smiling too, unable to stop yourself. “But you will win.”

He leans in a little closer. He smells like crisp, clean spring air and the flowers he’s been picking all morning and you wonder if you kissed him right now, if he would still taste sweet, like the berries you shared earlier. 

“You never know,” he says, that hushed tone that he offers you and you alone sneaking into his voice. “You may just best me yet.”

The strength of his steady, unwavering faith still surprises you sometimes, the way it seems like he believes in you above all else. No one’s ever believed in you like this before. You don’t know what to do with it. 

“Okay.”

You take off running without warning. You can hear him yelping in surprise, shouting something about cheating and unfair advantages, but you think to yourself that there’s nothing wrong with a little head start. He’ll always catch up to you anyways.

  
  
  


_“Name one hero that was happy. You can’t.”  
“I can’t.”  
“I know. They never let you be famous and happy. I’ll tell you a secret.”  
“Tell me.”  
“I’m going to be the first. Swear it.”  
“Why me?”  
“Because you’re the reason.”_

  
  
  


It’s a warm night, and you lie in the cool grass next to him, watching him point at the sky, finding the figures immortalized in the heavens and reciting the stories you’ve both learned by heart. Here’s Perseus, who slayed Medusa. Here’s Pegasus, whose beauty came from all that ugliness. Aran’s skin looks almost blue in the silvery moonlight, and you can see where the faint rays dip into the defined lines of taut muscle, the bony ridge of his elbow, his long, elegant fingers. Maybe, you think, the moon loves him too, just as the sun does, just as you do. 

He glances over at you and you no longer startle. You no longer fear being caught staring, because it’s always like this, his features smoothing out into something quiet and gentle the moment his eyes land on you, the soft curve of his mouth, the lightness settling into the set of his shoulders. He smiles, and you feel warm all over. 

“What?” he asks. “What are you thinking?”

And the truth is that you think many things when you’re around him—how you will never tire of seeing the sweet smile that tugs at his mouth when he spots you, how his voice often settles like a salve in your chest, how you will never cease to marvel at the way his strong hands are always so gentle, fingers intertwining with yours, tucking a stray lock of hair back behind your ear, settling on your hip as you drift off to sleep—but you would run out of time before you managed to say it all out loud, so instead you roll over towards him and kiss him. You’ve never been very good with words anyways. He smiles against your lips, and you think to yourself that you will love him, always, even if the world were to end without warning, even if there were no more tomorrows. You will love him. This is a prophecy you make for yourself.

  
  
  


_“When he died, all things swift and beautiful and bright would be buried with him.”_

  
  
  


The war comes to you when you’re least expecting it. You have almost forgotten, for just a moment, that this tiny oasis of calm you’ve found was always meant to be temporary. The war comes and calls upon kings and princes and warriors, and Aran listens to the news with his mouth pressed into a grim line, his shoulders stiff. He stares off into some middle distance like he doesn’t really see anything, and you stare at him, wondering if he’ll ever come back to you if he leaves.

“I don’t want to go,” he says to you, softly, under the cover of night. He’s curled up next to you, a thin blanket pulled over the both of you, and you’re supposed to be sleeping because you will have an early start tomorrow, but you’re not tired.

“Then don’t.”

He sighs. He doesn’t like this answer. His fingers reach out towards yours, his thumbs running along the lines of your palms. It’s a cool night, but he’s warm, like he always is, like he’s made of sunlight. 

“I have to.”

And this you know, you do, even if it’s not a truth that you want.

“Then you have to.”

He frowns, brow furrowed. He doesn’t like this answer either. He’s quiet for a long moment. 

“Will you come with me?”

His voice is small, like a boy’s. His hands, usually so steady, tremble as they hold onto yours. Your chest feels tight. You are still so very young in the long history of the world. 

This is not your war. There are no prophecies about your fortunes, your future, your legacy. You will die, you think, quite possibly, and he will be immortalized as a great hero. Or he will die a legend and you will return home alone and in obscurity. Neither end is one that you want, but he looks at you with wide, desperate eyes, and you know that this is not the time to start breaking promises. 

“Yes,” you whisper. “Yes, always.”

  
  
  


_“He is a weapon, a killer. Do not forget it. You can use a spear as a walking stick, but that will not change its nature.”_

  
  
  


He says the war will not change him. You fear it already has. Every day, news from the front lines makes him cold and stony. Every day, you see a darkness creep into his eyes. If the person you are today is the product of every day before, you begin to see the balance tip perilously in one direction, the slow accumulation of the bad outweighing the good, the hard days overtaking the easy ones behind you, and you worry. 

He doesn’t like it, the long journey, the loss you must endure before you even make it to the gates of Troy. He doesn’t like the other men you must make company with, the way they look at him like he’s a child who knows nothing about anything, the way they look at you like you don’t belong. You don’t belong, but the knowledge doesn’t ease the tension in Aran’s shoulders, doesn’t make him any kinder to anyone who isn’t you. You don’t like any of it either, but you can do it, keep putting one foot in front of the other, and there’s always been more to it for him than just the doing of it. 

You think you begin to see it then, the hero all the prophecies speak of. Heroes like him aren’t meant to be kind and soft, they don’t carry with them mirth and cheer. Heroes like him win glory in combat, and you begin to see the warrior take shape inside of him. He will be terrifying, you think, when you reach the battlefield. None of his enemies will know what to do with him. It scares you, seeing the boy you fell in love with get hollowed out by the hardness that surrounds you. 

But every night, he comes back to you, warm, steady hands and that soft, sweet smile you love so much. Every night, he returns to you and touches you with a kind of gentleness and reverence you never knew existed before you met him, and it is enough to have him just one more time.

  
  
  


_“What has Hector ever done to me?”_

  
  
  


A war is a series of choices, someone says to you. Picking battles, picking sides, picking enemies. You think to yourself that if it were your choice, you might not have come at all. But you’re duty bound, to him, to this fight, to all the many promises you have made, and even if you weren’t, you would not leave him.

A war is a story that’s already written, someone else says. The Fates already know who will live and die. All that’s left to do is wait for it all to play out. You think to yourself that if you could, you’d ask them to write a better one. But the Fates listen to no one, and even if they did, they would never listen to someone like you.

What you learn is that a war is both choices and unavoidable outcomes. You learn that each day that passes closes off some doors and opens others. Behind this one, a long life doomed to insignificance. Behind this one, a short one punctuated by the bright flare of glory. He promises to you every night that he will choose the right one, practicing the same refrains until they become instinct, murmuring promises into your skin like you will be the reason. 

_Shinsuke, Shinsuke, Shinsuke_ , every night, your name in his mouth like this is where it belongs, like he swears and re-swears an oath to you with each utterance. He loves you, he promises you, and he will never leave you, but you have grown up too much to believe that things will be just because you want them.

You think about choices. You watch the doors open and close in front of you, behind you. You hope that he will not be forced to choose. You hope that he will still have a choice, when the time comes.

  
  
  


_“Perhaps it is the greater grief, after all, to be left on earth when another is gone.”_

  
  
  


When you die, it’s less painful than you imagined. It’s over in an instant, being struck down by a spear, the ground rushing up to meet you. You hardly feel a thing, a numbness seizing you almost immediately. You see the red spilling out onto your hands and hear the sound of your own scream in your ears, but it is already over. 

When you die, what’s painful is what comes after. They bring your body back to him, and you can almost see something in him shatter, the way he throws himself over you, the way he holds you to his chest like his heart can beat the life back into you. How many gods, you wonder, would it take to put him back together? Would anything be enough?

He won’t let anyone touch you. He snaps, fierce and possessive, at anyone who tries. It is like this for days, each day building on the last until he is made of nothing but anguish. You begin to see that this is a way to love, too, the other side of the coin. Maybe this is how the madness took so many others before him. Maybe this is how all heroes end up falling, eventually.

  
  
  


_“I hope that Hector kills you.”  
“Do you think I do not hope the same?”_

  
  
  


All his warmth, all his gentleness with you has warped in your absence. You wonder if this is who he might have been if you hadn’t met him, if he didn’t have you to practice being kind with. You didn’t do it to save him, but you wonder if all that practice did any good after all. You wonder if you even practiced at the right thing.

He won’t eat, won’t drink. He hardly sleeps. You try to reach out to him, try to soothe his aching heart, try to reach through the veil separating your world from his ( _Aran, please_ ), but all it does is startle him in the dead of night, your name falling from his lips like a prayer, his eyes wide and glassy. He says your name now more than ever before, till his throat is raw, till his voice gives out. He says it like if he just repeats it enough, one day you’ll call back.

 _Come back to me_ , he says, begs, over and over and over, until it becomes nothing more than a litany of noise. _You promised you would be with me, always. You promised. Come back._

It’s impossible, a boy’s wish, a relic of a youth he’s been forced to give up too soon, and you want to tell him. You want to tell him that you will wait, that the end of the world could come and go and you would still be waiting, because this is how you love, sure and steady. But he can’t hear you, can’t see past his grief, and he refuses to bury your body, refuses to part with you, even like this.

  
  
  


_“There are no bargains between lions and men. I will kill you and eat you raw.”_

  
  
  


He nearly kills a god for you. He nearly drives himself mad for you. You want to tell him that you want none of this, that you never wanted to see him like this, because the boy that you love is so much more than all this carnage, but you’re dead, and there’s a part of you that thinks that maybe he wouldn’t have heard you anyways, if you still had the voice to speak. This is the strength of his devotion to you. This strength will be his downfall. This love will be his undoing. 

Is this the man or the god in him? Did you ruin him? Was his mother right? You, this small stain of mortality on him. You, so ordinary against his greatness.

You still wonder this sometimes. Not because you feel pitiful. Not because you feel small. But because you want to know, to understand. You never quite come up with an answer. 

When the day comes, after so long, it’s almost strange to hear a name other than yours from his mouth. _Hector_ , Aran snarls, spits the name out like poison. _Hector_ , he says, and refuses to hear anything else. It’s not an unreasonable thing, what Hector asks of him, but he is so far past propriety. 

What you learn that day is this: death, always, is over in an instant. Hector is here one moment, and then in the blink of an eye, a flash of red, he’s gone. It’s almost easy. Anyone can do it. 

What you learn that day is this: living is hard. Hector is dead but the pain doesn’t leave because the dead cannot bring peace to the living. You know this, you do. Hector is dead, but you still watch this boy you love grieve and grieve and grieve. 

It is a monumental task, convincing Aran to let go of Hector’s body, almost as much effort as it would be for yours. You wonder about purpose. You wonder if he has any left. 

After Hector is dead, Aran sleeps and wakes as if in a trance. He still doesn’t eat. Every day, he goes out to the battlefield that has cost him so much and will take more yet. Every day, he comes back, bitter and tired. You remember a time when the predictability, the routine, going through the motions brought you a comfort, but now as you watch him, all you can feel is that same weariness he holds in the set of his broad shoulders. He doesn’t bring anything, doesn’t take anything from it. An accumulation of nothing is still nothing. 

He continues to fight, without armor, without spirit, daring the gods to strike him down. And when they do, finally, clever Apollo whispering into Paris’ ear, he looks almost happy. You can feel his relief even from a world away. He has been waiting a long time too.

  
  
  


_“Go. He waits for you.”_

  
  
  


In the end, you must practice patience. Prophecies need to be fulfilled, bodies buried, monuments constructed. You almost do not make it, but just this once, you are lucky. Just this once, this goddess who scorned you in life chooses mercy towards you in death. 

In the end, you know this war was never yours to fight, and it has taken and taken and taken, but it is finally over. Troy fallen, the ships returning home, long journeys into the night. How many men, you wonder, have lived and died on these shores, how many boys who will never know old age, how many generations snuffed out? But it’s over. Those who still have stories to tell can pick them back up again, move forward, grow old and grey, if the gods choose to be kind. 

In the end, you know this boy was never meant to be yours, that every force in the world conspired to take him away from you, but you love him all the same, without rhyme or reason, because he has always been the best part of everything you’ve ever done, and he has taught you that happinesses are often hard to come by. You love him, and he’s yours again, finally, hand reaching out to you in the dark, an avalanche of light like the sun returning. Death is meant to be a cold thing, an absence, a lack of something, but you have never felt warmer. You have never known a peace like this. His hand in yours and you feel as if anything is possible once more. 

Your name is Kita Shinsuke. You are dead. You are done waiting, and you have all of eternity with him stretching out before you.

**Author's Note:**

> thank you so so much for reading! comments and kudos are always so appreciated!
> 
> come find me on [tumblr](https://youichi-kuramochi.tumblr.com/) or [twitter](https://twitter.com/kura_ryous) if you feel so inclined!


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